Mud and blood

From the favelas 

of Rio to the 

empty stadia 

is already odd,

an Olympic stretch

of reality making 

civilisation's

defining moments

seem shallow fraud. 

Unreal, surreal,

a pedant's sigh,

a Monk's tale,

superilluminated

in shaded cloisters

for the literati

drinking 12 ounces tall

with sugared jellies

in coffee shops that

are rather lax about

third world issues

and paying tax. 

Thin gruel for

the starving

who save their

'first looks' and

reviews for 

empty bellies. 

Meanwhile the

'first world',

and, who can tell,

perhaps the last,

throws out food

and plays with fasts,

imagining itself

witty and engaging

while contenting itself

with navel gazing

and wittering on

about suffering and God. 

On the back streets

the thin faces 

would trade 

civilised conversation

and sport

for food and love

in those forgotten places

where reality

is written in 

mud and blood.